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For many years it has been known that certain psychiatric disorders and symptoms tend to occur more frequently in families than within the general population and the evidence that genetics has a part to play in this is unquestionable.

Genetic studies of autism, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder show that the risk of developing the disease is related to the amount of genetic information shared with an affected individual. The likelihood of inheriting these disorders is at least 80%. This value is equivalent to the value for Type I diabetes and greater than that for breast cancer and Parkinson’s disease. However, it is important to realise these statistics only indicate the risk and that there are many genetic and environmental influences in these diseases.